


an absence of you

by nokomisfics



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: M/M, approach with caution, kudos to whoever made that playlist tho like a+ congrats on fUCKING BREAKING ME, like rEAL angsty, this is super angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 08:41:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4428815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nokomisfics/pseuds/nokomisfics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>phil finally snaps, and dan takes off.</p>
            </blockquote>





	an absence of you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [impossiblefandoms on tumblr](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=impossiblefandoms+on+tumblr).



> this fic was a journey! it was inspired by [this playlist](http://8tracks.com/sherlockscotthollmes/an-absence-of-you) which more or less broke me. shoutout to [kate](http://hopelesslyhowell.tumblr.com) for being my beautiful beta, as always, and another shoutout to the roommate for making me write especially when i didn't feel like it. y'all are the reason i don't entirely suck at life

Dan has always been a bit of a firecracker; on edge, unreliable. Dark. Phil wouldn’t say mysterious, just overwhelmingly unpredictable. He wouldn’t say that malicious, rude, hurtful Dan was somebody he regretted befriending. That’s just the way Dan is, and after living with the man for four years and knowing him for even longer, the fact of the matter is that Phil has fallen into the type of love that isn’t as warm and sweet as it is a web.

One he can’t escape.

It’s fine, actually. As long as Phil isn’t too obvious about it, and as long as Dan doesn’t actually open his eyes for once and acknowledge Phil’s feelings instead of just thinking about himself, himself, himself all the goddamn time, it’s fine.

And so it goes on. There are mornings where Dan will sulk in his sofa crease and skip cereal and coffee and conversation. When Phil asks him what he plans to do during the day, Dan lashes out and retreats to his room where he films angry, opinionated videos that he never will upload. Phil wonders on those days if the fans are really that oblivious - oblivious to the fact that Dan isn’t just satirical and sarcastic and socially awkward, but that he is a firecracker, and that he - very occasionally, very loudly - explodes.

Today is one of those days.

Phil saw it coming, as one is bound to after a remarkable number of years of living with somebody as predictably unpredictable as Dan. He hasn’t been quiet all morning, he hasn’t skipped breakfast or that anime they’ve been watching for a while now. He’s just been talky, and sharp at that. His eyes have been twinkling with mischief and a silent dare at Phil to stop him, to tell him he’s behaving inappropriately, and that he needs to locate his chill before he destroys the apartment accidentally but intentionally.

Phil doesn’t, and that is his first mistake.

His second one is to provoke Dan when he becomes a bit too loud over dinner.

They’ve cooked themselves a stir fry - Phil chopped up the ingredients, Dan did the frying - and have poured themselves a glass of red wine each. They’ve even taken the effort of clearing out the dining table and sitting at it, on opposite sides of it with their plates in front of them and their glasses of wine quickly diminishing.

Phil’s talking quietly, in between bites, about meeting up with Chris tomorrow.

“Let’s not take the tube,” says Dan, laughing loudly with his eyes on his plate. “Wouldn’t want you running into more of your.” A pause for effect. “‘Odd strangers’.” He raises his fingers to make air quotes when he says the last two words.

Phil stops chewing.

“Not quite sure why you do that really,” Dan carries on, cheeks flushed from the wine and the thrill of being rude to his best friend. “When we’re out of video ideas, most of us just take a few weeks off and procrastinate till we’re inspired.” Dan looks up at Phil from under his lashes. “But I s’pose your approach works too. Turn on the camera and talk about some random stranger woofing in your ear while walking by because that’s what random strangers do. Innit, Phil?”

At this point, Phil usually backs down, says something like “Let’s lay off the wine, yeah?” and suggests they turn in earlier than usual. But today he just. He can’t. And he knows it’s bad when his state of eloquence rivals that of most of the tumblr folk.

“I don’t make things up for my videos,” Phil finds himself saying. He’s set his fork down and pushed his plate away, and he’s glaring at Dan, and he doesn’t remember doing any of these things.

Dan smirks at him. “That’s debatable,” he declares casually, before returning to his food.

Phil’s fists that are resting on either side of his plate are now trembling slightly. That’s never happened before. “Dan,” he says in a manner he hopes is controlled and rational. “What are you trying to suggest?”

A shrug. “Nothing that’s never been suggested before.”

“That’s really funny,” says Phil, and his voice is shaking now. “Really funny that you’re judging my videos, when I’ve been at it for longer than you have, and half of the people subscribed to you have only done it because they’d like to fuck you.”

He knows they’ve crossed a line, because the only thing they’ve ever been able to argue over (properly argue, with raised voices and slammed doors) is the content of their videos, which is understandable because making videos is their job and they might as well take that seriously. But this has never happened before - Dan has never questioned his integrity, and Phil thinks he can deal with a lot of things if they come from Dan but he can’t really deal with this.

Dan lets out a low whistle, his head raised so that he’s looking Phil straight in the eye, and there’s a malicious glint in those brown eyes that Phil has always been wary of. “Wonder what our subscribers would say if they heard you right now,” he says, and his tone is horribly chastising. He clicks his tongue. “Sweet AmazingPhil using those terrible, vulgar words. But they don’t know you use them all the time, do they, Phil? I don’t know about you, but it does seem like a proper act to put up in front of an audience that’s stuck with you for eight years.”

“Shut up.” And he hates how soft his voice is now, and that there’s a wetness behind his eyelids, and the fact is that he’s never been good at arguments. Never been good at arguing with Dan. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” he adds pathetically.

There comes the distinct clink of Dan setting his spoon and fork down, and then he pushes his chair back and carries his plate into the kitchen. After a moment of contemplation, Phil takes his plate in behind him. Dan’s already got the tap running, and he’s holding his plate under the stream of water and watching the bits of solidified sauce stuck to the surface wash away slowly. His eyebrows are furrowed and his lips are pursed, and if Phil tries hard enough he could pretend the entire conversation didn’t even take place.

“You’re a grown man.”

Phil’s head jerks up and immediately he catches Dan’s eyes, and they’re blazing with something he’s never seen before.

“You’re a grown man, Phil,” Dan repeats, “And still all you can do is sit in front of a camera and lie.”

And the thing is, Phil knows that it’s a bad day. Phil knows that Dan’s probably been doubting himself for hours, that unfriendly thoughts are throbbing in his head and he’s only saying this to feel remotely better about himself, to validate the feeling of sinking with a very big rock tied to his ankles and a thick cloth over his eyes. Phil knows this, because he knows Dan, and Dan is his best friend whom he is in love with.

But he says it anyway.

“And all you can do, Dan, is fool people into believing you’re a decent person, and when they’re in too deep, screwing them over until they’d fucking kill to leave.”

There’s a loud crash. The plate in the basin, cracked. Tiny drops of blood mixing in with the running water to form a pale pink stream. And Dan, storming out of the kitchen and into his room, and slamming the door behind him.

+

It’s fine.

Phil’s awake, and the flat is eerily quiet, the smashed plate is still in the basin and Dan’s bedroom door is still shut, although Dan isn’t on the other side of it or, indeed, on the other side of any door in the flat, except the front door because Dan’s gone. Dan’s gone Dan’s gone Dan’s gone -

It’s fine.

Phil thinks if he keeps repeating the two words in his head, they might begin to mean something. No luck so far.

Dan’s done this before. He’s gone out for walks with Phil still asleep, sometimes to clear his head and other times to hunt for something obscure that he’s seen on the internet and would like very much to own as soon as possible. He’s impulsive like that. And full of life. And also reckless, which is the primary reason why Phil is scared.

He’s in the kitchen now. Phil’s gotten out of bed since, carried out a cursory check of every room in the apartment, and then retreated to his bed where pure panic overtook him for a good thirty minutes. He’s in the kitchen now, cleaning out the mess of broken glass pieces in the sink. The cereal boxes are still in the cupboard and the milk hasn’t been touched, so Dan must have left before grabbing some breakfast.

He pours himself a bowl and wanders into the lounge, trying very hard not to reach out for his phone and contact everybody he knows.

He fails.

He’s calling Chris before he can stop himself. The call rings twice, and then he cuts it, figuring it would be more nerve-wracking but definitely less conspicuous to just text him instead.

9:12 AM | Phil  
Hey! what are your plans for today?

It’s enough, he reckons. If Dan is at his place, he’ll mention something immediately. To distract himself from glancing at his phone twice in a second, he reaches for the remote and turns on the television. After seven minutes of surfing channels, his phone rings with a reply.

9:19 AM | Chris  
?????? aren’t u guys coming over later

Oh. Right. They were supposed to meet up today, weren’t they? For lunch. And a video, Phil thinks, but he doesn’t care enough to remember properly.

9:20 AM | Phil  
sorry, don’t think we’ll make it today. something’s come up

He’s barely kept his phone down when it buzzes once again.

9:20 AM | Chris  
it’s no problem :D hope everything’s fine!

Phil laughs at that particular choice of words, because he’s spent the past three hours convincing himself of precisely that. But it isn’t, is it? Nothing is really fine at all.

The silence of the flat is bearing down on him - void of Dan’s aimless chatter and the comforting sound of a television show they’ve both agreed on watching for the morning, it feels like a stranger’s house, somebody else’s lounge. Phil gets to his feet, fetches his coat and lets himself out of the flat.

The cereal is left on the coffee table, untouched.

+

Dan has always liked quiet days.

Phil knows Dan prefers exciting days, days when they’re swamped with things to do and places to be and people to meet and make awkward conversation with. He knows Dan lives for the days where he’s too busy to sink into the pit in his mind that makes him distant and unapproachable and just a little bit intimidating.

But Dan doesn’t mind quiet days. And it is a quiet day today, with the sun darting behind clouds more often than not and the people on the streets stepping aside to provide you with the blessing that is personal space, and the wind that has decided to be the perfect balance between a gust of excuse-me-let-me-take-your-hat-and-deposit-it-on-the-other-side-of-the-Thames and a gentler oops-sorry-don’t-mind-me-just-a-little-breeze-passing-through.

Dan would have enjoyed today, if he were still here with Phil. If he hadn’t taken off at some obscene hour of the morning to God knows where. They could have stepped out for a change, picked up hot drinks at Starbucks and gone for a long walk. Dan would have joked around, easy and familiar. He would’ve come up with something fun and creative to do today, something they could tweet about later.

Phil remembers the time when the both of them bought berets online and wore them out ironically.

“Look at us,” Dan had said, “The epitome of two British boys in London. Trenchcoats, check; berets, check; cheesy accents, double check.”

And all of a sudden Phil can imagine Dan as he’d looked then: a cheeky smile that always managed to draw forth a dimple in one cheek, hands stuffed into the pockets of his Darth Vader coat and a blue-green beret sitting awkwardly on top of his fringe. Standing on the streets, far enough that they won’t bump elbows when they walk (because Dan has always been conscious about this sort of thing) but close enough that Phil can hear everything he says, and the heavy breaths he draws in and out of the cold air.

Phil remembers asking a passerby to take a picture of them for the fans, but they never did upload it anywhere. Maybe it was because they were standing too close together (because it was bloody cold and, well, body heat) and leaning into each other in a way that could come across as something else, even though it wasn’t meant to. And they’d always looked good together, but it was especially pronounced in that picture, and it didn’t feel like something the fans needed to see.

Trapped in the memory, Phil presently walks into a fellow pedestrian who’s stopped abruptly in the middle of the road.

“Oh!” he shouts, stepping away as his cheeks flush. “So sorry.”

The man turns around (presumably to look angrily at him), but immediately his features change when his eyes land on Phil. “I know you!” he says loudly in a very American accent. “You’re that guy from YouTube - what’s his name - ?”

“Amazing Phil?” Phil volunteers.

“That’s it! God, I watch you all the time. What a lucky coincidence!”

Phil wonders detachedly if a frequent watcher of his videos would have actually forgotten the name he goes by, but nevertheless stands with him for a quick selfie and signs the back of a white receipt, which turns out to be the only piece of paper the boy can come up with. Just as Phil’s about to walk away, the boy reaches out and says, “Where’s your best friend, then?”

Phil stops walking abruptly. “Who?” he asks stupidly, and then it clicks. “Dan?”

“Yeah, him. Thought you guys go everywhere together.”

Phil finds himself resisting the urge to snap at him, because it’s a very juvenile thought but most of his subscribers think it anyway. “He’s still asleep,” he says instead, and then wishes the boy a good day - what was his name? He mentioned it. Matt? Eric? something of the sort - and walks off.

9:52 AM | Phil  
hey. just ran into an american subscriber while i was out. he couldn’t get my name for a moment, which was awkward, and i almost flailed

10:11 AM | Phil  
he asked for you actually, so i thought i’d come fetch you. where you at?

+

Back in the apartment, Phil peeks into Dan’s room half-heartedly and notices something he hadn’t noticed when he came in here in the morning: a small, rectangular object peeking out of the black duvet. He sighs loudly in frustration, only because he’s far too civilised to yell.

+

7:03 PM | Phil  
haven’t i always told you to take your phone with you when you go out? 

 

7:09 PM | Phil

jesus, dan. where are you.

+

After dinner, Phil calls Louise.

“Hullo, sweetums!”

“Hey Louise. Listen, I just wanted - “

“What’s wrong, love? You sound worried. Is everything alright?”

“Yes, I mean. Yes. Mostly. It’s just that Dan isn’t home.”

“Oh. Where’d he pop off to now?”

Not with Louise, then. “The store,” he deviates quickly. “We wanted to check if you’d like to have a dinner with us this weekend. D’you feel up to it?”

“Yes, of course. We’ll make time. Are you sure everything’s alright, Phil?”

“Yes, why wouldn’t it be?” And then, before she can respond to that: “G’night Louise. See you.”

“Take care, darling!”

+

He checks all of Dan’s social networking accounts before he goes to sleep; there aren’t any new updates, although he wasn’t expecting any. He wonders how Dan is doing without his phone. He wonders how Dan is doing, period. He’s in bed by ten, but doesn’t fall asleep till much later, curled up on his side with one of the playlists in Dan’s phone playing softly in the background.

+

The next day, Phil wakes up from what feels like a bad dream, but is in fact just a memory from six years ago that’s been buried for so long in the overwhelming mess that is his head. It goes something like this:

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

A giggle. “Hi.”

“Hey.”

It’s not the first time they’ve Skyped, but the weirdness of talking (actually talking, with voice and all) to a far away internet friend hasn’t worn off just yet. So it’s familiar to voice call Dan, but it’s still exhilarating in the best ways possible.

“Say something else, you dick.”

Phil meows.

“Remind me again how you’re twenty two.”

“Jesus, Dan. Hasn’t anyone taught you not to remind a woman of her age?”

The call carries on to the wee hours of the morning; by four, if Phil remembers correctly, the conversation has dwindled to sleepily whispered half-phrases that don’t even make sense.

“I should go to sleep,” Dan says, yawning loudly.

“Yeah.”

“Good night, then.”

“Good night.”

There’s the sound of Dan shuffling around, probably towards his laptop to cut the call, so Phil says abruptly, “Wait.”

“Yeah?”

“Can we… stay on the call? Till the connection gives. Or something. If that’s fine with you.”

There’s a very long pause, and Phil’s heart has begun beating at a remarkable tempo. And then a long breath, exhaled slowly. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s cool.”

“G’night Dan.”

“Night-night, you bum.”

The call ends at seven thirty, both of them lulled too deep in the land of the dreaming to notice.

+

Phil checks the apartment thoroughly again, although he knows he won’t find Dan. Feeling dejected and lost and lonely, he crawls back into bed and buries his face in his pillow, hoping to find some respite there. He doesn’t.

Then, cautiously, he enters Dan’s room and, less cautiously, collapses onto his bed.

At noon, Phil wakes up to the sound of Dan’s phone ringing. He rolls over grubbily and reaches for Dan’s phone, which he’s taken to carrying around along with his own.

PJ is calling.

He lets the call go to voicemail, and listens as PJ disconnects without leaving a message. Phil hadn’t thought of going through Dan’s phone yesterday, but he sits up and unlocks it now, opening the messaging app and allowing himself to forget for a moment that he’s invading his best friend’s privacy.

Immediately his blood is spiked with adrenaline.

6:01 AM | Dan  
hi, sorry it’s so early. can i come over?

8:00 AM | Peej  
i was asleep! yes, of course. is Phil coming with? should i prepare breakfast?

9:14 AM | Peej  
hey man. where are you? the eggs are growing cold

The messages had been sent yesterday. Heart thudding in his chest, Phil crosses his legs underneath him and struggles to deduce something with the crumpled mess that is his mind. It doesn’t help that he’s sitting on Dan’s bed, alone in Dan’s room which - incidentally - smells a lot like Dan himself. And all Phil really wants to do is bury his face in Dan’s pillow and cry until his throat is raw and Dan is, miraculously, beside him again.

He fishes for his phone among the creases of Dan’s blanket and, upon locating it, calls PJ.

“Phil,” he hears PJ say breathlessly the moment he picks up the call. “Is Dan okay? I’ve been trying to contact him for a while.”

Phil feels his stomach clench. “Why didn’t you just call me?” he asks, and he doesn’t mean to come across as angry but doesn’t really care if PJ misunderstands him at this point.

“I thought,” PJ stutters, “I mean. I thought - “

“I haven’t seen him since two nights ago.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah. So he didn’t go over to yours?”

“He texted me real early in the morning yesterday, said he was coming over, but he never did. Have you tried calling him?”

“He left his phone at home.”

A long pause. “Shit.”

“Yeah.”

+

He’s not with PJ. He’s not with Chris, or Louise, and Phil is running out of ideas. Because Dan has gone out for long walks, and he’s stayed out for hours on end, but he always comes back. And Phil has never conditioned himself to the possibility that he won’t.

In the evening, he leaves the flat at six and walks what feels like the whole of London. He visits all of Dan’s favourite spots: the comic book store, the arcade, the ice cream section of Tesco. He ducks into alleyways and even walks all the way to PJ’s place, looking out for anything that might have distracted Dan on the way there. Nothing - that’s all he finds. And nobody. No Dan.

It’s nearing midnight when he finds himself by the Thames, staring into the water. The night is cold and his stomach is rumbling, but he can’t be bothered to find himself some food. He can’t stop thinking about Dan - angry, confused, hurt. Sad. Wandering somewhere, lost. Too stubborn to come home. Jesus, his chest is aching, and he’s never felt this desolate before. Phil is convinced he’s being torn apart.

He distracts himself with another memory, something that isn’t as gut-wrenching as Skype calls in 2009 when Dan was just a few pixels on a screen and everything was already thrilling:

“It’s snowing!”

Dan’s laugh had always been contagious. Phil watched as Dan ran forward, past the old and abandoned hospital and into the field of snow behind it, spread far and thick like a sea of white. Before he knew it, Phil was running behind him, too. And he was laughing, tackling Dan into the ground, reaching out to tickle his neck till they couldn’t breathe.

They laid side by side on solid ice and stuck their tongues out, catching snowflakes on them like little children. Dan launched into a story he’d had up his sleeve for a while, and after a moment of listening, Phil tipped his head and tuned him out and just watched. Those lively, dark eyes. That deadly, dark grin.

When Dan fell silent, he grinned stupidly and said, “Love you, mate.”

Dan reached down then, tangling their fingers and pressing their palms together shyly, like he wasn’t sure this was something friends did. (Phil didn’t mind too much, either way. He never had.) And then under the sky and the stars and the following snow, he said in return, “Love you, too.”

+

On the long walk home from the Thames, Phil checks his phone.

7:20 PM

Three missed calls from Zoe S

7:23 PM | Zoe S  
phil, are you home? pls pls tell me u are .it’s about dan

7:45 PM | Eoin (Agent)  
Hi Phil, it’s Eoin here. I’d like to speak with you and Dan about a few ideas we’ve come up with regarding your suggestion of giving the two of you a joint brand. Please let me know when you are free. Cheers!

7:46 PM

Seven missed calls from Zoe S

7:47 PM | Zoe S  
phil i am so sorry, i dont know what to do please call me asap

8:15 PM | Zoe S  
i dont know where he is phil, i’m sorry.

Zoe? Zoe Sugg?

It makes sense, reasons Phil as he jabs at his phone with frozen fingertips. Dan knew he would never have thought of phoning Zoe. He’s stopped walking, now standing underneath an awning and cursing repeatedly and creatively under his breath, waiting in annoyance for Zoe to pick up.

“Phil?”

Her voice is thick. She’s definitely been sleeping, but Phil doesn’t care. He can’t.

“Was he with you?” he demands.

There’s the sound of Zoe moving about, possibly to sit up in bed. Phil wonders if Alfie is with her. He and Dan have never liked either of them too much, and it stings to know that Dan went to them when he could just as easily have come home.

“He came by last night,” Zoe says. Her soft voice, usually bright and cheery, sounds heavy and different. “Really late, like one or something. Walked the entire way. He hadn’t eaten anything the entire day, and he didn’t even when I insisted. He crashed on the couch and slept until late afternoon.”

Phil bites his lip. “Did he say anything?”

“Just that he didn’t know where else to go and needed a place to spend the night.”

“Was he drunk?”

“Oh, God no. Just really, really pissed.”

Phil shuts his eyes tightly, commands his voice not to shake when he says, “Why didn’t you call me?”

“He told me not to. Kept repeating it over and over: don’t ring Phil, don’t ring Phil.”

There is a knife in Phil, and it’s ripping his torso open. When he swallows, he can feel its blade at the back of his throat. “And?”

“And he’s gone now. I popped out to the shop because we ran out of tea, and when I came back he wasn’t on the couch or anywhere else. That must’ve been around seven? He didn’t leave anything behind, I’m afraid, and I haven’t heard from him since.”

Phil drags in a deep breath, lets it out. The hand that’s pressing his phone to his ear begins to shake.

“Are you at home?” asks Zoe quietly.

“I’m not.”

“Maybe he’s gone home, Phil.”

“Maybe.” Most probably not, though.

Phil cuts the call not long after, apologising (begrudgingly) for phoning so late and keeping her up. He steps out from the awning, and a light drizzle has begun to fall, so he pulls up the hood of his hoodie and sprints the entire way home.

Dan isn’t in the flat.

He was expecting it, but finds himself blinking back tears of anxiousness anyway. He stumbles into Dan’s bedroom and stares at the bed, his head spinning. He feels at least a little bit drunk. Thoughts scattered, he pulls off his wet hoodie and slips his feet out of his shoes, and then strips completely and falls into the bed, naked and cold. He reaches out for Dan’s phone.

Doesn’t find it.

In a panicked frenzy, he pulls the duvet back and searches the entire bed. Climbs out of it, looks underneath it. It isn’t here.

Then he looks for Dan’s laptop, and it’s gone.

Dan was here.

Hot and cold all over, Phil retrieves his own phone and pulls up Dan’s contact. He stares at the picture he’d attached to Dan’s number: Dan in his green and red Christmas jumper, grinning compliantly at the camera with his arms wrapped around himself. He’d looked so huggable that day, floating in a jumper that was a size too big and only trackies under them. And when he smiled that way, like he was holding back a laugh, and his eyes twinkled… it took the edge off of him. Until he became that guy Phil fell in love with.

Maybe… maybe, in retrospect, Dan was right. Phil has lied about not being in love with Dan for a long, long time.

He presses the green button and listens, heart in throat, as the call rings out before going to voicemail.

“Hi, you’ve reached Dan Howell. I’m either super busy at the moment or actively avoiding you. Leave a message after the beep to find out!”

Yes, well. It wasn’t like he was expecting Dan to answer on the first try.

+

1:12 AM | Phil  
hi. so, i know you’ve been home. and im sorry i was out. but you could’ve just stayed

1:14 AM | Phil  
what are u even trying to do Dan. block me out completely? bc im worried for u & i feel helpless and this isnt funny anymore

1:17 AM | Phil  
look. just tell me you’re safe. please, dan

+

3:09 AM | Dan  
im safe.

3:12 AM | Phil  
where are you?

3:13 AM | Phil  
im sorry for the things i said, ok? u know how to rile me up. & you weren’t being particularly agreeable either

3:16 AM | Dan  
yeah

3:16 AM | Phil  
where are you?

3:17 AM | Dan  
nick’s.

3:17 AM | Dan  
can u come ovver?

3:18 AM | Dan  
please

+

Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Phil thinks he should be tired. Or something. Because it’s four AM and he’s long since given up trying to hail a cab, he has decided to walk the entire way to Nick’s, or his body decided and he’s just going with the plan as if on auto-pilot. It’s really fucking cold and there’s something missing in his chest where Dan used to be.

Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Phil thinks this isn’t what love was supposed to be like. Love was supposed to be safe, and colourful, and new. But Dan is anything but safe. He’s made of dark colours, he’s been around for so long. And Phil would pinpoint the exact moment he fell in love with Dan except it was a process. A journey of dailybooth comments and formspring questions and skype calls with crackly connections, buying tickets for trains and boarding trains and getting off trains, hugging Dan, moving in with Dan, learning everything about Dan. There were so many things to do and somewhere along the way, falling in love with Dan got added to the list, too.

Nick opens the front door and blinks at Phil, bleary-eyed and concerned. “He’s upstairs,” he says in a thick voice, stepping aside to let Phil in. Phil tries to nod and say something grateful but he gives up and sprints up the stairs instead. He hears Nick shut the door behind him and walk into the kitchen. He’s grateful for the privacy, too, and he’ll have a word with Nick later and maybe buy him an ice cream or something, but for now he just needs to run.

Dan’s in the balcony. Phil almost walks past it, walks past him, but through the double glass doors he spots Dan sitting cross-legged in front of the barristers, pale hands wrapped tight around them, and he stops and stares. Dan’s wearing a black shirt that hangs off his shoulders - has it always been that loose? - and his hair is messy and dark. Phil slides the door open and steps into the balcony and a cold draft hits him instantly. He wants to be calm and rational, wants to go and sit cross-legged next to Dan and say something pretentious about the fucking stars and how much he’s fucking missed him, but then he’s saying “You bloody bastard” in a choked whisper, and kneeling behind Dan and burying his face in his hair, wrapping his arms around Dan’s chest, pulling him closer, closer, closer.

“Phil,” Dan’s saying. “Phil, hey, come on let go.”

So Phil lets go and rubs at his eyes. “You bloody bastard,” he repeats. Dan turns his head to look at him, and then Phil sits down next to him and says, “The stars are nice tonight.”

“You’re here,” says Dan in reply. His voice is thin but familiar and it washes over Phil, bathes him in something bittersweet, twisting in his gut and pulling at his chest,

“Of course I’m bloody here.” Phil’s forgotten Dan’s face, and he realises this as he takes it in, the sunken in eyes and hollow cheekbones. “Have you been eating?”

Dan just looks at him.

His lips are pale, Phil notes with despair; pale and cracked. “You’re dehydrated,” he says, and even he can hear the worry in his voice, it’s thick and heavy and palpable. Dan looks small like this, cross-legged and leaning forward, fists around the barristers. Like a child, lost. “Say something,” Phil says forlornly, softly. Then, “Dan,” softer still.

“I don’t.” Dan speaks abruptly, and then stops, and Phil just nods, waits. “I don’t know what to say,” says Dan finally. His voice is thicker than usual and tired from disuse, and Phil wants to squeeze him, shakes with how badly he wants to be pressed up against his best friend again, a concrete reassurance that this is real, that he is here.

Phil composes himself, breathes out slowly. Turns his head to look out and straight ahead. “Why did you go?” he hears himself ask.

“Because you didn’t want me there.” Dan says it so simply, easily, like he’s been practising the statement, keeping it at the tip of his tongue, readied for when he will finally deliver it, and it stabs Phil somewhere important.

“That’s not - “ Phil begins. Stops. “Oh, Dan,” he murmurs, pressing his head into the curve of Dan’s neck, shuffling closer to his body and pressing their sides together. “That isn’t true,” he murmurs. “Even when I’m mad, or frustrated. I’m always going to want you around.” I’m always going to want you.

Phil doesn’t miss the way Dan leans into him, curls around him like he doesn’t quite know how not to. “But you said - “

“I was mad.” Phil rushes in, desperate to say something, to justify himself even though he knows he shouldn’t be the one making excuses, “I didn’t mean anything I said. I don’t think I - I wasn’t thinking, Dan, I was just so mad.” His voice dwindles at the end, becomes small and feeble, and he wonders if Dan is listening because he isn’t moving, isn’t even breathing.

“But it’s true,” whispers Dan eventually, voice hoarse, and Phil breaks. He breaks.

“No,” he wants to say. Doesn’t, because Dan’s talking again.

“I’ve always been - I mean, you know me.” He leans away, voice cold. “I’m not exactly the nicest person to live with, am I? I eat all of your cereal. And I don’t talk to you for hours sometimes, even if you’re asking me something. I’m always in the worst mood and I - God, Phil, I’m the most terrible - “

“You’re not.”

“But I’m not even that nice to work with either, am I?” Dan laughs now, choppy and bitter. “Everybody’s noticed that by now. I play down all of your jokes, act like they’re dumb even if I find them funny, especially when I do, because I’ve got it in my head that we’re in our twenties and we need to be fucking mature and sometimes I get so frustrated that you don’t feel the same, that you haven’t forced yourself to become something else for the fans. I’m just - I’m just shit, Phil. Beside you, I’m just a pile of crap.”

Dan’s begun to breathe hard, his fingers shaking where they’re resting in front of him on the floor now, gripping at the tiles. Phil’s first instinct is to rush at him, pull him back and smother him till he knows that he’s loved, that he’s wanted and he’s okay and everything is okay, really, and it’s fine to feel this way sometimes, but Phil knows Dan. And Dan needs to be by himself for a bit. Just for a bit.

And by himself. Not… not alone.

Phil remains silent, clenches his hands into fists to stop himself from reaching out for Dan out of sheer force of habit. He bites his bottom lip and sits completely still, and he’s spread out in gangly limbs and sharp, concise points but right now he feels like a little ball, rolled up and tight with energy.

They fall into a familiar kind of pause, and the sun’s begun to peek at the horizon. It’s five, probably pushing five-thirty, and London will spring to life soon. Phil wonders if Nick’s still in the kitchen or if he’s returned to his bed, and then he thinks of their apartment and if he locked it before leaving. He thinks of their apartment in Manchester that didn’t feel like home for the longest time, until Dan went out one day and returned with a little keyboard from a garage sale somewhere. And how the music was new and, eventually, familiar.

The energy seeps out of him. It’s sucked out, it feels, by Dan who’s sitting beside him, stationery. There’s something calming around Dan, a force that’s always been there. Something steady and crackling, loud and strong and dependable. There’s something in the way Dan’s sitting straight but his head is tilted, tilted, tilted. Tilted at Phil.

“Hey,” says Phil, and he takes Dan’s face in his hands and kisses him.

The angle’s a little off. Dan wasn’t looking at Phil, so the kiss starts out sideways until Dan’s conscious enough to turn his head a little, and then Phil hums appreciatively and kisses him a little deeper, a little harder. Dan’s lips are soft and his face is warm under the pads of Phil’s fingers, and he presses them into Dan’s cheeks and the place where his dimple sometimes breaks through.

There is nothing in this that isn’t familiar. It doesn’t feel like a first kiss. It feels like… like. Exactly like how it should feel to kiss Dan.

“Don’t stop,” Dan says when Phil begins to draw away, but Phil pulls back and bites at his bottom lip anyway, eyes on Dan, desperate for any kind of reaction.

Dan laughs.

It starts off as a giggle. Soft, far away. Then his face scrunches up, and colour seeps into his cheeks and the dimple shows and there it is, that smile, small and shy and so fucking completely Dan that it takes Phil’s breath away, quick and easy. Dan shakes his head, shakes with his laughter, and he’s running a hand through his hair and tugging at it, then he’s reaching out and tugging at Phil’s hair, circling his palm around the nape of his neck.

“You love me,” says Dan, easy.

“I do.” Phil nods earnestly, leaning back into Dan’s touch now. “Do you know now, how ridiculous you are? How can I not want you around when I want to spend every second, every day - “

“You love me,” says Dan again.

“I love you.” Phil nods. Earnestly.

Dan surges forward to press their lips together, and Phil hears himself make a soft sound, something meek and needy. “Do you?” he whispers against Dan.

“Yes,” Dan says, nodding into Phil’s face and kissing him again, over and over and over.

The sun rises. It’s bright and big in the sky and draws them out of each other so that they detach and giggle quietly. “Reckon Nick will mind this?” Dan’s asking, and the tease is back in his voice, making it lilt into something quirkier and calmer.

Phil knows he’ll deal. He knows this isn’t over, that there will be bad days again and Dan will be so frustrated with himself he’ll throw some of it at Phil, too. But Phil knows he’ll deal, because this is Dan, and Dan never promised to be easy. Dan promised to be loud and obnoxious and notorious, to steal cereal and pad about at 4AM, still stark awake. Dan promised to be difficult and tricky but… but real. At any given time. Three-dimensional, familiar, and undeniably real. And that’s the man that Phil loves, loved, will keep loving. Will never stop.

“Come on then,” he says, getting to his feet and pulling Dan up with him. “Let’s go home.”

And Dan follows. Easy.

**Author's Note:**

> feed my ego, leave a review! [constructive criticism encouraged :D]
> 
> alternatively, follow [my tumblr](http://oopsiwritefanficdonttellmum) for more fics!


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